Page 79 - The $100 Startup_ Reinvent the Way You Make a Living, Do What You Love

years ago, long before Facebook, a band with an underground following figured
this out. Here’s what Jerry Garcia said about the Grateful Dead’s followers:

There’s a lot of that stuff with people bringing their kids, kids bringing their
parents, people bringing their grandparents—it’s gotten to be really
stretched out now. It was never my intention to say, this is the demographics
of our audience. It just happened.

Tom Bihn, a bag manufacturer from Seattle, Washington, gives us a similar
idea: “We’re consistently and pleasantly surprised by the diversity of our
customers. People have a natural desire to categorize and quantify, but we’ve
always felt doing so with our customers would be pointless. They’re students,
artists, businesspeople, teachers, scientists, programmers, photographers,
parents, designers, farmers, and philanthropists.” (Read more of Tom’s story in
Chapter 13.)

Changing the “Who”

A busy working mother from Hudson, Ohio, Kris Murray saw an opportunity in
helping child care providers run their businesses more effectively. For years she
dutifully worked at building relationships one by one with day-care centers, only
to get frustrated with their low prices and lack of interest in developing the
business.

Despite the challenges, Kris knew it could be a good business. Families will
always need child care, and child care providers are usually more focused on
providing quality service than on managing the business side of things. How
could Kris break through with a successful offer, and how could she boost her
income as she served her clients? The early days were discouraging. She was
exhausted, overwhelmed, and ready to quit.

Then something changed. First, she streamlined her services, making them
more oriented to what her clients clearly wanted—she learned to give them the
fish. But the second change was also important. In Kris’s words, she found a
way to “change the WHO”: the clients she worked with. Many day-care centers
were microbusinesses themselves, run by one or two people. Although these
centers may provide good child care, they tend to be wary of investing in
services and therefore aren’t the best fit for Kris’s consulting practice.